NJ home owned by real mobster🕴️ for sale & the benefits of For Sale by Owner listings 🏠

Happy Tuesday North Jersey!

It may have been an especially rainy one, but I hope you had a great weekend nonetheless.

We're more than halfway through August, which means that the end of summer is quickly approaching. While I don't necessarily want summer to end, I think I'm ready for all of the fun that comes with fall. Between cooler weather, fall drinks, pumpkin carving, apple picking and much more, there are a ton of things to look forward to. Lucky for you, all of us at NorthJersey.com will be working tirelessly to bring you everything you need to know about fall right here in North Jersey. So be sure to look out for that.

For now, though, let's get into this week's real estate updates.

New business openings

Let's get into some recent business openings in North Jersey:

• Mendoza Tops & Tile recently opened in Morristown. The business offers full residential and commercial home renovations, specifically kitchen and bathroom spaces. Their work includes materials like granite, marble, quartzite and engineered stone.
• In Wayne, the Christine Valmy International School of Esthetics & Cosmetology opened earlier this month. The school features specially-designed classrooms for theory, hands-on practice and clinics where students will learn about spa and salon services, including skin care, hair styling and manicures.
• Mr. G's Diner held its grand reopening this past weekend in Paterson after being closed for extensive renovations. This classic 1940s diner is known for its pancakes, home fries and other class diner fare.

Are you opening a new business in North Jersey, or know of one in your town? Or, know of a business closing in your area? Send your information and photos to business reporter Daniel Munoz at munozd@northjersey.com so we can include them in our next roundup.

Forget 'The Sopranos,' this NJ home for sale had a real mobster for an owner

For David Zimmer's latest historic home for sale, he takes a look at 42 Collamore Terrace in West Orange . Listed this month for $899,000, this freshly remodeled Tudor revival was once owned by mobster Samuel "Big Sue" Katz.

Katz was a longtime associate of Abner "Longie" Zwillman, a Newark native who became North Jersey's kingpin of organized crime and was known as the "Al Capone of New Jersey." Katz was referred to as Zwillman's "constant companion," and was charged in 1959 with bribing a juror in Zwillman's 1956 tax evasion trial.

Dating back to the mid-20th century, the home's interior was fully modernized as part of a full restoration completed this year. The four-bedroom, three-bathroom home features an open-concept kitchen with quartz countertops, custom cabinetry, stainless steel appliances and a spacious center island, as well as a living room with double-height cathedral ceilings, a natural stone fireplace and built-in shelving. There is also a second-floor laundry center, a finished lower-level recreation room, an attached garage and two covered patios.

Do new real estate rules make For Sale by Owner in NJ the better option?

A new set of real estate regulations aimed at creating a more transparent and buyer-friendly market — implemented as part of a settlement with the National Association of Realtors — officially went into effect for New Jersey at the start of this month, and nationwide on Aug. 17. These new rules include things like mandatory buyer representation agreements, required seller's property condition disclosure forms and designated agency.

And now, it seems there's a certain group of transactions that could benefit the most from these new guidelines: For Sale by Owner listings . These types of listings are where the seller of a home does not work with an agent to sell their property, and instead the listing process on their own.

Previously, home sellers were required to cover the commission costs for both the listing agent and buyer agent involved in the transaction, which was typically 6% of the home's sale price. So with a For Sale by Owner transaction, the seller was still required to pay a 2% to 3% commission to the buyer's agent, or no commission if neither party used an agent. But under the new rules, sellers will no longer be required to pay the commission for buyers' agents. This means that sellers who choose to list their property as For Sale by Owner may be able to forego commission costs altogether, regardless of whether a buyer is working with an agent or not.

Read our story, which breaks down how else these new regulations will benefit For Sale by Owner listings.

Jersey City to see the region's third-highest number of new apartment units in 2024

In RentCafe's annual Apartment Construction Report, the New York metropolitan area was found to have the overall most new apartment construction in the nation for 2024, with 32,935 new units expected by the end of the year. This is the third year in a row that the region has topped the rankings.

Our region also came in second for having the most new apartment units completed from 2019 to 2023, at 116,207 units, and leads the nation for having the most new apartment units expected to be built from 2024 to 2028, at 150,327 units.

And within our region, Jersey City was named the third-busiest city for creating new apartment units in 2024 . This Hudson County city is expected to welcome 2,412 new apartment units by the end of 2024, twice as much as are expected in other apartment hubs like Queens and White Plains: 1,232 and 1,218, respectively.

Other North Jersey cities to make the listing include No. 7 Hackensack, with 686 units; No. 8 Newark, with 592 units; and No. 10 Passaic, with 397 units.

Gallery of the week

For this week's featured gallery, we're going to take a look at a home built by two students from Roxbury High School as part of Habitat for Humanity .

The three-bedroom, two-bathroom modular ranch was constructed by Frank Caccavale's Structural Design and Fabrication class after he approached Morris Habitat for Humanity in 2019 about partnering on a home build right at the school. The class of 2021 started the home and the class of 2022 completed the two separate portions of the home, which were lifted by cranes onto flatbed trucks in May for the six-mile trip across town.

A family was recently chosen for the home. This includes Samuel Tadesse and Senait Tessfaye, along with their three children, who emigrated from Ethiopia and married after settling in the U.S. 13 years ago.

This is such a heartwarming story and shows the care that residents in North Jersey have for their community. And it shows how easy it is for us to make a difference right here in the Garden State.

Check out some more work from myself and others below. But for now, that's what's up in North Jersey. See you next time!

Maddie McGay is the real estate reporter for NorthJersey.com and The Record, covering all things worth celebrating about living in North Jersey. Find her on Instagram @maddiemcgay , on X @maddiemcgayy , and sign up for her North Jersey Living newsletter. Do you have a tip, trend or terrific house she should know about? Email her at MMcGay@gannett .

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: NJ home owned by real mobster🕴️ for sale & the benefits of For Sale by Owner listings 🏠